Eastern European girls outperform male counterparts

THE Leaving Certificate performance of girls from eastern European countries in their home languages far outweigh those of their male counterparts.

As the familiar trend of higher proportions of As and honours grades (A, B or C) scored by female students in the vast majority of subjects is repeated again this year, analysis of the smaller numbers taking non-curricular EU languages show there is little difference among those who may have come to the country in recent years.

The non-traditional language with the highest number of candidates for Leaving Certificate this year was Polish, for which 286 female and 288 students got results on Wednesday. But while 22% of females got an A and 92% got an honours grade, the equivalent figures among male students were 8.7% and 85.1%.